In 1987, 42% of software developers in America were women. In the 1990s, those numbers dropped.

By Tracey Welson-Rossman (Founder, TechGirlz)

TechGirlz was born out of curiosity. After spending the first part of my career working with mostly women in both the childcare and healthcare industries, I moved into the information technology consulting space as one of the founding members of Chariot Solutions, a software and mobile development firm. I was shocked to notice the lack of women in my business meetings and even more shocked at the lack of female developer candidates who passed through our doors.

I began to research in order to gain a better understanding of the issue. In the 1960s, computer science was considered women’s work.

Over the last three years I have seen over a thousand startups in their early stages. I witnessed many of them go from an idea to funding within several months. I have also seen some of them fundraising for years and not getting anywhere.

When it comes to funding, there is one thing that can increase your chance of getting funded astronomically – traction. Yet, founders often struggle to get traction and hope that investor money will help them get it. This problem can be solved if you start lean, test your product and and gather meaningful feedback from your customers.

I’m an introvert. Extended social interactions exhaust me and, after awhile, I hit a wall. There are so many things that terrify me about networking. Where I struggle in person, I shine on paper. Instead of small talk, I tweet. Instead of appearing on panels, I blog out my expert advice. Additional marketing? My portfolio speaks for itself. That and I give good email.

Writing — it’s how I’ve managed to build up a business in which the work practically comes to me. So where can you let your writing do the talking?

I created this presentation for entrepreneurs who need online tools to make their ideas happen (I gave it earlier this year at the Professional Women’s Association in Milan).

The presentation “Tools for Entrepreneurs: Create. Collaborate. Communicate.“ started out as a way to explain very technical things to non-technical people, but I quickly realized that most people when approaching technology get intimidated by the “What’s DNS? Do I need a dedicated server?” kind of questions and therefore feel they can’t understand technology.

I love podcasts – I wrote A Guide to Podcasts and recommended some podcasts for food lovers, tech lovers, and everyday listening. I run my own all-Italy podcast called Eye on Italy.

One of my favorite podcasts is the Harvard Business Review IdeaCast — ideas for leadership, business, economics, and all-around smart and concise topics for entrepreneurs, managers, and idea leaders. Most episodes are

The Hidden Demons of High Achievers

The episode from last week was called “The Hidden Demons of High Achievers” with Tom DeLong, Harvard Business School professor and author of “Flying Without a Net: Turn Fear of Change into Fuel for Success” about people who feel a high need to achieve and how their fear of losing their image of competence can lead them to putting too much emphasis on succeeding the first time, and other demons that can cripple progress.

I don’t consider myself a high achiever but definitely an achiever and some of the behavior he described struck some chords within me, such as his description of a person with a high need for achievement:

“…very very smart, and at an early age have learned how to leverage that characteristic, highly competitive, impatient with other people and themselves, in most everything they’ve done they’ve been successful, hungry for feedback and mainly positive feedback, and they traditionally have overloaded agendas.”